Everybody is blessed with a body when born. A temple, a frame, a bag of bones. Whichever way you wish to see it, your body is a tenement for your soul — your mind, thoughts, feelings. And with this great responsibility of taking care of your tenement comes many choices. Choices involving other people’s bodies *ahem*, choices involving what you eat, what you wear and how you decide to use your body.
As I’ve grown into a young female adult, I’ve realized just all of the choices and decisions I acquire just by simply being alive and well. Just as soon as I realized the choices I had, I realized the objective opinions that come along as well. Everywhere I looked, people were telling me how to use my body, how to decorate it, how to replenish it. I was taught from elementary school and on to cover my body, to wear skirts that passed my fingertips when putting my arms flat (every girl knows this one), to constantly pull up my undershirt at risk of cleavage being shown. It was a sin if the slightest amount of my bra strap was shown. (Do you know that your bra straps move out of place when you make literally, any movement, at all?).
If I don’t succumb to the organic and healthy trends of today’s society and treat my body as a greenhouse, I am ignorant and damaging it. If I am perfectly healthy, but don’t work out, I am not using my body to its full potential. Even worse, If I am a male and don’t work out frequently, I am less masculine. If I decorate my body with tattoos (I consider this an art form), I am seen differently. If I pierce my nose I am unprofessional. If I only eat one or two meals a day, I do not care about my body, and I am too skinny. If I eat five meals a day plus two snacks and a dessert (reminds me of my younger self), I equally do not care about my body, and I am labelled fator careless. It is honestly hard to keep up.
If I cut my hair, I’m a dyke. If I dye it red, I want attention. If I am confident in my body, I am vain. If I’m not, I have self-esteem issues. If I share my body with others, I do not respect it. But what does all of this really mean? What is the value in these opinions and things people order us to do with our bodies? I’ll tell you — nothing.
When you move into a new house, you have a street full of neighbors. All different houses, all different colors, different flowers, different people occupying these habitats. A home is usually the reflection of the person or family. My dad lives in farm house in the beautiful town of Chester Springs, land stretching for acres where the nearest neighbor is too far to hear or see. My mother lives in a modern, suburban house filled with things she loves from Marshalls and HomeGoods. My mom hates our neighbor’s yellow window frames. She thinks they’re cheap, tacky, sometimes she doesn’t even look in the house when we pull in. But does my mom tell my neighbor to change his horrendous yellow frames? No. Why? Because hers aren’t yellow, they’re black, and she likes black, so why should my neighbor not have yellow?
My point is, you do not tell others how to decorate their homes. The place that holds their lives. You do not tell others how to decorate and paint and make their homes because you do not occupy their homes. You do not wake up every day in a home you hate, cursing the pink wallpaper and hardwood floors. You wake up every day in your own home, with your own wonderful belongings and people and things that make up your life.
Every day, I wake up in my own body. And every day, I am told how to present it. I will live in this body for the rest of my life. Why does it matter to anyone else if I pierce my nose, if I put on a few pounds, if I use my body pleasurably? How does this affect anyone but me? My neighbor does not wake up in my body, my teachers do not wake up in my body, my ex-boyfriend who called me a slut does not wake up in my body. This is my home. This physical frame holds the most important and valuable items I will ever own; my heart, my thoughts, my spirit. This is the body that has borne me for 19 years. It has treated me well as I have tried to reciprocate the best I can. But even if I hadn’t; that’s alright. Because it’s my body. It’s the only thing I will ever truly own, and I do not have to explain my choices. I do not have to explain how I decorate it, justify how I use it or defend how I feel about it.
The thing is, your body is not a temple. And it’s not a holding cell, and it’s not even REALLY a tenement. It’s not a pile of organs constructed correctly in order to help you breathe and function. Your body is your home. Your body is where you laugh, where you cry, where you are born and where you die. You wouldn’t take the daisies off of your front lawn because the girl in your chem class prefers roses. You wouldn’t avoid building a pool because your boss can’t swim. Home is home.
We need to move towards an era where we embrace our bodies, where we love them and appreciate them because we do what we wish with them. This is not exclusive to girls — everybody needs to embody this message and practice it. Everybody needs to realize that they are given their individual lives, bodies and minds for a reason. Our individuality is what builds the world, it’s what creates balance and order. Embrace your body. Embrace your mind. These are the things that will never be under the ownership of another person. The sooner we can learn to truly love and respect ourselves, the sooner this world will know a place with less hate and judgement.
